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SUNDAY, OCTOBER 24, 2010 Man, 27, killed in Prince George’s fire; dozens homeless
BY STEPHANIE MCCRUMMEN A 27-year-old man was killed
early Saturday in a three-alarm fire that swept quickly through two brick buildings in a Suitland apartment complex, leaving at least 24 families homeless as the sun began to rise, Prince George’s County fire officials said. Officials have not yet identi-
fied themanwho died, andMark Brady, a department spokesman, said the fire appeared to have originated in the man’s ground-
floor unit at the Carriage Hill Apartments, a sprawling com- plex of 54 buildings at 3362 Curtis Dr. Three civilians and three firefighters suffered minor injuries from the fire and thick smoke, which engulfed interior stairwells and hallways, and forcedmany residents onto their second- and third-floor balco- nies, where firefighters used lad- ders to rescue them. “There was so much smoke
you couldn’t see,” said Nichelle Willis, 27, who escaped in her underclothes through a sliding glass patio door. “The guy up-
stairs was screaming, ‘Help me, helpme.’ I just started to cry.” About 100 firefighters and
paramedics responded to the fire about 4:30 a.m. By then, the flames had spread from the ground floor upward, Brady said. Eventually, several floors and the roof of that building collapsed. The fire spread to a neighboring building and partially destroyed its roof before firefighters brought the blaze under control about 7 a.m., Brady said. “I would say some of the
residents rescued were certainly in a life-or-death situation,” Bra-
dy said, adding that the cause of the fire is under investigation. The buildings did not have sprin- klers, which were not required when they were built, probably in the 1970s, he said. The injured firefighters and
civilians were taken to a hospital and were expected to be treated and released. Two firefighters had minor burns on their ears and shoulders, and a third suf- fered from a spike in blood pressure. Two people had minor burns and a third suffered from smoke inhalation, Brady said. The rest of the displaced and
dazed residents, many of whom did not have renter’s insurance, gathered Saturday morning at a community center. There, the Red Cross and the complexman- agers, Southern Management, were trying to sort out newliving arrangements in vacant apart- ments in the complex or else- where. Family members and neigh-
bors stopped to visit. About noon,Willis, an occupa-
tional nurse, began taking stock of her loss and her luck. Gone was $1,300 from a pay- check she had cashed Friday. So
was her identification and all of her clothes, including her uni- form, which made her wonder what she would do about work on Monday. Gone also was the furniture that she and her girl- friend recently purchased to start a new life together in the apartment. “Every single, solitary thing —
all I have is the clothes on my back,” she said, noting gratefully that the shirt, pants, socks and shoes were given to her by strangers. “But it’s your life. I’m so thankful I have life.”
mccrummens@washpost.com
Some voters describe struggles but are sticking with O’Malley unemployment from C1
(following a string of better months earlier in the year). O’Malley emphasized that the state’s rate remains more than two full percentage points below the national average. Yet while Maryland routinely
looks better than most other states, such monthly snapshots fail to capture the hundreds of thousands who have lost work and clawed back into Maryland’s labor market at lower pay, or who have held on to jobs, but with furloughs or at reduced pay. Four in 10 likely voters inMaryland say someone in their home has lost a job or had hours or wages cut in the past year, according toWash- ington Post polls. For O’Malley’s nearly complete four-year term, the unemploy- ment rate is more than double what is was on the day he took office and the state is down a net 79,400 jobs. Despite those stark facts, Eh-
rlich hasn’t effectively capitalized on the economy or been able to swing Maryland’s many unem- ployed residents to his side. In dozens of interviews state-
wide over the past month with those who have either lost jobs or have familymembersout of work, a three-part answer might best explain why Ehrlich’s seemingly attractive platform of lower taxes and more jobs has failed to take hold among a swath of the state’s economically challenged that is easily large enough to affect Maryland’s election. One: Unemployed and strug-
gling voters aren’t hearing Eh- rlich’s message, but they are hear- ing O’Malley’s. Two: If they un- derstand why Ehrlich says he’s running, they don’t necessarily believe he can deliver on taxes or jobs. And three: The skepticism seems rooted partly in O’Malley’s negative portrayal of Ehrlich’s re- cord as governor and his work in the four years since for a lawfirm connected to oil and banking industries. “The jobs arewhy people are so
angry— and the health care, and all that,” said Katherine Ferrell, 76, a Democrat in Queen Anne’s County on the Eastern Shore. A retired “farmer’s wife,” Ferrell said she’s doing what she can to help her daughter and grandson who have lost jobs in construc- tion in the past year. Ferrell said she’s seen O’Malley’s ads and thinks he’s doing well on educa- tion and as well as he can on the economy. “People need to give it a chance. It takes time,” she said. “Ehrlich wants back in — are
you kidding me? Jeez o’ flippin’,” said Bowie resident William
Maryland, if elected. “Ehrlich has talked a lot about
small businesses and all of the roundtables he was holding spoke to that,” Eberly said. “But because he didn’t have the money to put thatmessageonthe air, you didn’t really know that was what he was saying unless you were at one of those.” Ehrlich has attempted to make headlines in the last twofinancial reporting periods, showing larger fundraising totals than O’Malley since late summer. But the in- cumbent had amassed millions before Ehrlich entered the race, allowing him to spend nearly $6 million in the last six weeks on television ads that have saturated the state as most voters have begun to tune in to the contest. Parry-Giles and Eberly said Eh-
rlich’s sharper tone on unemploy- ment increases under O’Malley in recent debates as well as his latest ad seemed focused, but to have been most effective should have been aired weeks ago. In ads and at campaign stops,
O’Malley has honed lines that seem to resonate with state vot- ers. Four months of brisk job gains early in the year allowed him to begin his campaign talk- ing about momentum in the state’s economy. With other lines, he’s also
AARON C. DAVIS/THE WASHINGTON POST
Floretta Brown of Silver Spring prepares for a computer training class designed to help job seekers. Brown, a secretary, says she hopes the technological training will provide an edge as she continues her search for work, often in competition with people who have college degrees.
Freed, 65. The retired federal worker said a TV ad got him thinking about his electricity rates, which he says have dou- bled, and how it is Ehrlich’s fault. Freed’s unemployed daughter
has moved back home, and his son has struck out formorethan a year looking forworkafter hewas laid off from a job selling sod in Columbia. He blames Maryland’s repre-
sentatives and others in Con- gress, including House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D), for not doing more to help the econo- my. “I’m just fed up with the whole two-party system,” he said. But that sentiment doesn’t ex- tend to the Maryland governor’s race. “I still like O’Malley,” Freed said. “If you’re Bob Ehrlich, you’re
distressed by that,” said Todd Eberly, a political science profes- sor at St.Mary’s College. “Nation- ally, people concerned about jobs and the economy are breaking overwhelmingly for Republicans. But inMaryland, Ehrlich has not been able to replicate that pattern . . . he has not been able to capitalize on that.”
GARR. CO.
ALLE. CO.
WASH. CO.
FRED. CO.
Maryland
NOTE: September data by county not available
CARR. CO.
MONT. CO.
unemployment rate August 2010
HOW. CO.
A.A. CO.
P.G. CO.
CHAS. CO.
CAL. CO.
MARY’S CO.
ST.
BALT. CO.
HAR. CO.
CECIL CO.
KENT CO.
Q.A. CO.
5% 7% 9%
win, he said. Perhaps most trou- bling for Ehrlich is that the for- mer governor has been unable to “identify and isolate for voters a specific policy or action byO’Mal- ley that contributed to the unem- ployment picture in Maryland,” he said. There’s O’Malley’s boosting of
SOURCE: Bureau of Labor Statistics Ehrlich entered the race six
months ago saying he hoped to re-create in deep-blue Maryland the rare Republican victory that Gov. Chris Christie pulled off in November in the nearly equally Democratic-leaning New Jersey. But it wasn’t Christie’s message on jobs and the economy that propelled him to victory. New Jersey voters said they were deep- ly concerned about the economy, but that didn’t end up being a key factor in how they decided to vote, exit polling showed. If any- thing, a perceived notion that Christie would “bring needed
50 miles Desk:
Run Date: Size:
Artist: Local 10/23/10 23p2 x 2.2” THE WASHINGTON POST
change” was the quality that mat- tered most to 39 percent of voters —67 percent of whom supported Christie. Trevor Parry-Giles, a professor
unemployed.ai MAP PROOF
thorpg @ 4x4552 CCI-SLUG filename.XTN
Chemical odor leads police to alleged campus drug lab
drug lab from C1
were cleared. Students were briefly allowed
back inside the building three hours later, then ordered to leave again. “We didn’t find out until 2 1/2
or
three hours later what was going on,” said Katya Funk, 18, a bleary- eyed freshman in asweatsuit. “It’s been so much fun.” Authorities entered the room
Saturday afternoon to remove the chemicals. University spokes- woman Julie Green Bataille said there was no sign that any toxins had spread. “It appears to be confined to that one room,” she said. “It will
have to be decontaminated.” Displaced Harbin Hall resi-
dents milled around among res- cue vehicles and drug-sniffing dogs. Gawkers included the uni- versity’s bulldog mascot. Students at Georgetown, as at
many colleges, are known for occasional binge drinking and casual drug use. Hard drugs are less common,
students said, and a drug lab in a freshman dorm room was hereto- fore unheard of. “For this campus, this is very
out of the norm,” said Kayla Bost- wick, 18, aHarbin resident. “This should not happen.”
devised@washpost.com
(dropped / / 08)
of political communication at the University of Maryland, said Eh- rlich may have miscalculated from the beginning if New Jersey was the inspiration. A combina- tion of an extremely unpopular incumbent in former governor Jon S. Corzine and a strong desire by voters to oust those perceived as connected to state corruption that came to a head last year were also powerful factors in Christie’s
the sales tax from 5 percent to 6 percent, which Ehrlich has prom- ised to roll back, and Ehrlich has generally criticized O’Malley’s broad-based, $1.4 billion package of tax increases in 2007, Parry- Giles noted. But the former gover- nor has failed to pinpoint specific job cuts caused by O’Malley’s ac- tions, or been able to distinguish how there was anything different the governor could have done to prevent those losses in the face of the national recession, he said. One of Ehrlich’s main venues
for discussing the economy has beena series ofmorethanadozen “small-business roundtables,” which often attracted fewer than 100 people. At those gatherings, he has promoted a bill of rights for small-business owners and other efforts he said that he would undertake to draw jobs to
ROBERTMCCARTNEY Moran, Edwards ponder what went wrong for party mccartney from C1
cit once the economy recovered. They didn’t focus enough atten- tion on the battle against long- term unemployment or highlight that most people’s federal taxes have actually been lowered un- der President Obama. “We have not been the best messengers,” Edwards said. “That’s a little bit of hindsight.” She added that the nation needs to be “really thinking creatively about how to do job creation . . . how are we creating jobs over the next 20 years.” But some other explanations
TheWashington Post is printed using recycled fiber.
NF407 2x1.25
of the Democrats’ woes, especial- ly fromMoran, seemed compla- cent and even counterproduc- tive.Moran believes that Demo- crats are temporary victims of knee-jerk opposition to the “pro- found, watershed event” of elect- ing an African American presi- dent. The GOP’s current energy is fueled largely by fear and rac- ism, he said, and by manipula- tion of grass-roots sentiment by a handful of ultra-rich families
funding the tea party. “Many people who will be
elected in theHouse and Senate don’t represent the majority,” Moran said. The expected GOP surge will be short-lived, he pre- dicted, because Obama’s reelec- tion campaign in 2012 will spur increased turnout among minor- ities, liberals and the young. The Republicans’ current in-
tensity shows only that “the brightest stars are most often shooting stars which are on their way down,”Moran said. That kind of thinking is not
going to help the Democrats or the nation. For one thing, pas- sionate opposition to Obama is not automatically a sign of rac- ism, and I’ve got an excellent ex- ample to prove it: Bill Clinton. There was a strong backlash
against the Democrats in 1994, two years after Clinton pushed a national health-care program, just as there is now. It wasn’t rac- ism then, obviously, and it’s mis- leading and unfair to assume that racism is the GOP’s primary motivation now.
As for the rich footing many of
the tea party’s bills, yes, it’s hap- pening and is the latest sign of the problem of the exploding in- fluence of money in politics. But the people who are about to vote for the GOP, according to polls, are energized mainly by dissatis- faction with the status quo and dislike of the Democrats’ poli- cies. If the liberals want to storm
back in 2012, they’re going to have to convince people that they offer more-effective government. It’s not enough to rely on com- plaints about racism and fat cat interference. As one would expect from self- described liberals, Edwards and Moran agreed that the problem with the stimulus package – de- rided by the GOP as ineffective – was that it was too small. Given that the economic recovery seems so tepid, I think that might be right. It also was to be expected that
they thought the Democrats weren’t sufficiently aggressive in pushing their agenda.Moran
said the party needed to be less defensive and instead “present a positive vision for America.” Ed- wards said Democrats too often “started to compromise before we really took it to a fight.” More surprisingly, though, the
two also agreed that when the economy gets going again, it will be necessary to make broad spending cuts to rein in the defi- cit. They were both willing to support cuts in entitlements such asMedicare and Social Se- curity, which liberals usually de- fend. Their only condition for con-
sidering such reductions was that other programs be vulnera- ble, too—such as defense spend- ing and farm subsidies. “Every single thing needs to be on the table equally,” Edwards said. That sounds like a key plank
for a Democratic platform for the next two years. If they’d made clearer how they felt about it ear- lier, maybe they’d have a better chance of hanging on to the House onNov. 2.
mccartneyr@washpost.com
found ways to gloss over many of the state’s worst months of job losses, saying Maryland “created or retained jobs better than all but a handful of other states.” Translation: Maryland lost
72,500 jobs in the 12 months ending in December 2009, and that amounted to losing jobs more slowly than most other states. Under scrutiny, the mean- ing of the line becomes perplex- ing. By O’Malley’s math, one of the states that did better is New Jersey, which has an unemploy- ment rate of 9.6 percent. For Lal Hangzo, 62, an unem-
ployed loan officer in Takoma Park who was reading job listings Friday at the state’s unemploy- ment office in Wheaton, the na- tion’s economic upheaval and his personal plighthave hardly trans- lated into a desire for ballot-box vengeance. Besides,hemay be too busy to vote. Of politics and his August lay-
off: “I really don’t see the two of them connected at this point,” said Hangzo, who said he leans Republican. Will he vote? Maybe. On Elec-
tion Day, “hopefully not, but I may still be out looking for a job.”
davisa@washpost.com
Staff polling analyst Meredith Chaiken and assistant polling analyst Kyle Dropp contributed to this report.
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